About
Tai Tapu Sculpture Garden is an evolving sculpture garden and native regeneration project.
Our mission is to support contemporary sculpture practice in New Zealand and to enhance native biodiversity in Canterbury.
Since Autumn 2010 over 8000 native trees and shrubs have been planted. Our aim is to recreate a podocarp forest of totara, matai, and kahikatea. The garden is also home to rare or threatened native plants of Canterbury. Just 20 minutes from the Christchurch CBD, this once bare one hectare paddock is thriving. It is a sanctuary to native birds and sculpture lovers alike.
The Garden opens to the public for exhibitions, with the major event being the Annual Autumn Exhibition held over the first three weekends in March. You can also visit the Garden by appointment outside of the major exhibition.
Park details
Entry is $20pp and free to 16-years-and-under during the exhibition (first three weekends in March).
All are welcome and onsite parking is free. The Garden is pram and wheelchair friendly. All tracks are grassed and the terrain is mostly flat. Picnickers are welcome during open hours.
The Garden may be visited by groups outside of exhibition times by arrangement with the owners.
Our People
Founder
Peter Joyce
Peter Joyce is co-founder of Tai Tapu Sculpture Garden and affectionately known as ‘head gardener’. Since his retirement from medicine in September 2016 he is able to spend considerably more time on this role. Not a day goes by that Peter isn’t planting, pruning, weeding, envisaging or planning for TSG’s future. Peter’s vision is to create a podocarp forest, that in 1000 years time, may look similar to what was on this land prior to colonisation.
Before retirement, Peter was a doctor in the Canterbury health system for nearly 40 years, including 19 years as Professor and Head of the Department of Psychological Medicine and 11 years as Dean of the University of Otago, Christchurch.
His lifetime passions began with cricket, then chemistry/biochemistry, and then mental health research. His research focused on bipolar disorder, depression and eating disorders; and explored treatments, causes, genes and prevalence. Now in retirement he is dedicated to his new passions for native biodiversity and sculpture.
Peter is available to show visitors around Tai Tapu Sculpture Garden by arrangement throughout the year – Contact us.
Artist & Founder
Annabel Menzies-Joyce
Annabel Menzies-Joyce is co-founder of Tai Tapu Sculpture Garden. She grew up on a family farm at Menzies Bay, Banks Peninsula. This stunning natural environment led to a respect for the land that influences her every day actions and shapes her artistic practice.
Annabel trained as a nurse before embarking on the obligatory ‘Overseas Experience’. Upon her return to Christchurch she completed a Diploma of Fine Arts at the University of Canterbury. Hankering for more, she then completed a Post Graduate Diploma of Landscape Architecture at Lincoln University. Three daughters later, she returned to painting and exhibited in a number of galleries. Over the past decade Annabel has worked in cast glass, enjoying the challenges of this fickle medium and realising a new sculptural language. She exhibits at Form Gallery in Christchurch, various pop up shows and at Tai Tapu Sculpture Garden’s Annual Autumn Exhibitions.
In her spare time she enjoys tramping and exploring remote landscapes, such as Fiordland, Campbell Island and Antarctica. Annabel has always loved animals, and is currently the mother or grandmother of four dogs and a great brood of chooks.
Curator
Melissa Reimer
Melissa Reimer is committed to bringing excellent art into everyone’s lives, with a strong desire to see more sculpture in public spaces and private residences throughout New Zealand.
In addition to curating the Annual Autumn Exhibitions at Tai Tapu Sculpture Garden and working alongside the owners to build a Permanent Collection, Melissa sources artworks – big and small – for a variety of clients, advises on placement, and facilitates commissions by connecting artists and art lovers.
From modern architectural icons to seaside baches; beautiful backyards; private memorial sites; public spaces within sub-divisions, and urban plazas, Melissa wants to shape those spaces through contemporary art.
Melissa undertook her formal studies at the University of Canterbury, completing her Doctorate in 2010, with a thesis examining the influence of modern art on writing and music at the fin-de-siècle. Her particular fields of interest include the life and literature of Katherine Mansfield; Impressionism in the Arts, and NZ sculpture.
Melissa worked in Christchurch galleries CoCA, Chambers 241 and was a Friends of the Christchurch Art Gallery committee member for seven years. She was manager of Wanaka’s Gallery 33 from 2010–12 and part of the Sculpture in Central Otago exhibition crew at Rippon, Wanaka.
If you're keen to make your commercial development stand out; or to make the view from your breakfast table more interesting and inspiring, contact Melissa and visit TSG. See what we have and chat about what's available. We can connect you with artists whose work you like.
Crew
Gerrard Thomson
Gerrard Thomson is a landscape architect with over ten years’ professional experience in this field, after an almost 20-year career in the finance sector. From residential to commercial sites, he designs beautiful, useable and manageable spaces that specifically meet the practical and aesthetic needs of the people they are created for. His designs respond thoughtfully to the climate, and complement, rather than impose upon, the natural environment.
In the public realm, he envisages open green spaces for people, more pedestrian-friendly zones in the city centre, and safe and convenient cycle ways connecting neighbourhoods with popular spots and amenities. He wants more trees … everywhere, and more sculpture throughout the city and in every backyard.
When he’s not at his desk, Gerrard enjoys running and biking in the Port Hills. At TSG he helps with installations and a variety of other jobs, as needed.